Albanians in Kosovo

Originally posted by Al Jassas Hello Carpathian   don't try to spin things around, es-bih brought quotes and there are videos showing that the church was directly involved in the conflic. Karazdic himself said that the church was the main partener in EVERY dicision made by the Serbs and this means that if they didn't outright bless Srebrinica, as the video of the scorpions show, they condoned it. Here is a scholarly article by a Balkan expert with links that shows how religion and religious establishments particularly the Catholic and Orthodox churches in the conflict. http://209.85.135.104/search?q=cache:sPh8G2WcCfwJ:www.georgefox.edu/academics/undergrad/departments/soc-swk/ree/velikonja_ihs01.doc+Role+of+Serbian+orthodox+church+in+balkan+wars&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1   Al-Jassas

No priest would push for one just as no imam would push for the other.

No one would, no one would... blah blah, Njegos was a cleric and he was the one who wrote the poem. Even more, in the poem we hear of the orthodox clergy rejoicing in the massacre. Njegos' poem tells of soldiers reporting these massacres to the metropolitan, who listens to everything with delight.

On the whole, there is a large amount cooperation with the clergy in the story.

I can understand the property destruction such as a mosque which was a symbol of opression in the ideas of the Orthodox for many years under the tyrannical turkish rule.

Its symbolic of the hatred and that this poem and many similar ones, such as Cvijic's poem about Kosovo, where once again there are mentions of rejoicing at the slaughter of Muslims. These poems are still popular among the Serbian nationalists, Karadzic did recitations of them. This self-victimization of Serbs with these poems have led to so much of the suffering in the Balkans today.

As Tim Judah put it, in the Serb consciousness 'ideas of national liberation became inextricably intertwined with the act of killing your neighbor and burning his village.'(Serbs: History, Myth and the Destruction of Yugoslavia)

You can read the whole poem here: http://www.rastko.org.yu/knjizevnost/njegos/njegos-mountain_wreath.html

And Im not here to make you believe anything, you made up your mind a long time ago and nothing I say or present could ever change your views.

Here is a journal article on the topic: http://masud.co.uk/ISLAM/ahm/the_churches_and_the_bosnian_war.htm#_ednref67

The article is on the whole very pro-Muslim, however it contains a few anecdotes here or there, particularly from Michael Sells which have meaning.

Edited by Theodore Felix - 31-Jul-2008 at 20:18

Originally posted by Theodore Felix You can read the whole poem here: http://www.rastko.org.yu/knjizevnost/njegos/njegos-mountain_wreath.html And Im not here to make you believe anything, you made up your mind a long time ago and nothing I say or present could ever change your views. Here is a journal article on the topic: http://masud.co.uk/ISLAM/ahm/the_churches_and_the_bosnian_war.htm#_ednref67 The article is on the whole very pro-Muslim, however it contains a few anecdotes here or there, particularly from Michael Sells which have meaning.

Poem also talks about bringing old Serbian warriors back to life. That must be true too.

Yet the issue of killing Muslims comes back, especially in poems like 'The Dinaric Man', which states that 'To kill lots of Turks is for him the only way of avenging his ancestors.' And when Serbs re-entered Kosova in 1912, this poem along with the actions of the Mountain Wreath seemed to have become a model for their actions. Only the Turk became the Albanian.

In an article just recently posted in the NY Times:

Mr. Karadzic was intimately familiar with Serbian epic poetry. A skillful player of the gusle, a single-string fiddle traditionally accompanying the oral performance of epic poems, he clearly understood his role in the light cast by Vladika Danilo. He recognized himself in the martyrdom of leadership; he believed that he was the one to finish the job that Vladika Danilo started; he saw himself as the hero in an epic poem that would be sung by a distant future generation.

Genocide's Epic Hero

Edited by Theodore Felix - 31-Jul-2008 at 22:49

Now, this is the map of the Cetinje with all of its settlements:



And these are the Ceklics:



And this is all of Danilo's Montenegro:



On it, the number 1 is Cetinje and number 3 the Ceklics, to the left.

The following is the development of Montenegro, and in some changes it correspond's today's. The dark blue to the lower left is the "Old Montenegro" that was in Danil's time:



And let us determine the total size of the population, and also keep on mind at the same time that only a small handful of it was of Islamic faith. According to the Ottoman census from 1523:

* Cetinje - 97 houses

* Ceklics - 45 houses

We should keep in mind that the event occurred over 180 years after this census. But to demonstrate the increase of the population, I shall present the Montenegrin population census from the period of 200 years afterward, 1910:

* Cetinje - 487

* Ceklics - 188

Which shall further define the precise magnitude of this event.

Tthe precise appearance of this as a myth is precisely because of Danilo himself. He indoctrinized that, made it a legend in Montenegro (this, completely marginal but indeed unfortunate event), in order to not let the Turkish faith spread into Montenegro, he made sure that this event is remembered - and therefore, folk telling handpicked it to become some sort of a turning point of Montenegro's liberation from Ottoman Empire, as the day when Montenegro is no longer under Ottoman grip and independent. Therefore, it was sang to, in 1847 the pinnacle of Montenegrin/Serbian epic was written in dedication to the event (which actually made the broader Serb public introduced to the whole thing), in 1937 the text for the modern Anthem of the Republic of Montenegro was composed celebrating the cleansing of Montenegro from the infidels - and that changed today. It is the evolution of the human society, and does not present then's "evil genes" of the Montenegrins & Serbs as that writer would try to present - in 2004 when the national song was elected by the parliament the new Anthem of Montenegro, the verses celebrating the massacre were left out.

Now, nobody actually complained about this in particular anyone - in Montenegro or outside, west or east (and the Mountain Wreathe was translated to Japanese and became very, very well known in Japan, as well as Great Britain) that this is even remotely horrible - not even the Muslims in the Balkans themselves. It only occurred with the Yugoslav wars, and only in this a bit odd attempt to actually connect ethnic cleansing and war crimes that occurred with an event recorded in a letter and various versions of folk telling during the Age of Romantic Nationalism, when there was lawlessness (and in technical eyes, when a Christian killed a Muslim or vice versa on religious basis he committed no crime whatsoever and doesn't need to answer for anything)...I always attempt to be neutral in everything, but this indeed is Serbophobia.

Originally posted by Theodore Felix Yet the issue of killing Muslims comes back, especially in poems like 'The Dinaric Man', which states that 'To kill lots of Turks is for him the only way of avenging his ancestors.' And when Serbs re-entered Kosova in 1912, this poem along with the actions of the Mountain Wreath seemed to have become a model for their actions. Only the Turk became the Albanian. In an article just recently posted in the NY Times: Mr. Karadzic was intimately familiar with Serbian epic poetry. A skillful player of the gusle, a single-string fiddle traditionally accompanying the oral performance of epic poems, he clearly understood his role in the light cast by Vladika Danilo. He recognized himself in the martyrdom of leadership; he believed that he was the one to finish the job that Vladika Danilo started; he saw himself as the hero in an epic poem that would be sung by a distant future generation. Genocide's Epic Hero

I only stood by what I wanted to say, and that is some sort of demonizing of Montenegrins & Serbs because of their epic telling hundreds of years ago, which is indeed illogical fallacy.

To use some analogy, I shall quote a great Albanologist, Mary Edith Durham, High Albania, 1909:

"'´Servian!´ said an Albanian to me but a month or two ago. ´Servian ! Yes, I have heard so much that I understand it, but I will not soil my mouthby repeating their dirty words!´

´Why do you hate them so?´ I asked.

´Because,´ he replied calmly, ´we are born like that. It is in our blood.´

´Like cats and dogs,´ said I.

´Exactly so, mademoiselle. It is like cats and dogs.´

Things look so different through other windows. When the Albanian loots or burns a Slav village, his act, in the eyes of Europe, is ´an atrocity.´ Seen through Albanian glasses it is quite another color.

And of course, if I would actually use this in an attempt to make some point (you all know what I am alluding to) - which is the last thing on my mind (or to get a better impression, not even the last) - I'd be definitely with an anti-Albanian sentiment.

By the way, what is that poem from 1912? Who wrote it?

P.S. Yes, that about Radovan Karadzic from NYT should be correct, for an example like Ramush Haradinaj interprets the things archaicly today, like the way Durham described it.

Also a lot of parallelism between islam in the 90s and the 500 + years of opression.